Your Identity Structure

 Hello All,

"An identity structure is a self-image, an image you carry inside you of who you are and what your role is in relationship to others. If you were hurt a lot as a child, you might have an image of yourself as a “victim.” That self-image will make you more likely to take on the role of the victim in a current situation. Or if you fought back as a child, you might have developed an image of yourself as a “warrior.” That self-image will make you more likely now to take an aggressive stance, rather than a passive one, no matter what the situation. Other examples of self-images might be “achiever,” “lover,” “realist,” and “dreamer.”

Because a change to an identity structure tends to feel like a threat to the self, we usually resist it. Maintaining our familiar identity structures can actually feel to us like a matter of life and death, so we unconsciously try to eliminate any experience or evidence that would challenge them. People will often reveal that they are guarding an identity structure by saying something like “This is who I am” or “That’s just how I’m made.” Our need to maintain our old, familiar sense of “who I am” often makes us want to maintain our survival patterns, even when they are causing us suffering. This is also why we often fight so hard for our limitations. Those limitations have become part of who we think we are."  - Steven Kessler

Grace=Peace,

Jeremy